Health care professionals at medical institutions are routinely required to use various instruments to perform bedside tests on patients to monitor various aspects of patients' health. These tests generate substantial amounts of medical data which is often collected and organized for subsequent analysis. The data can include results of tests to determine the level of one or more analytes (e.g., blood glucose, ketones).
Traditionally, the primary means for collecting and organizing data obtained from the instruments is a printed or transcribed record of the test results. To review the results, a health care professional either retrieves the results from the institution's records department or goes to the patient's room. Since these results are often available only in printed form, chronological and statistical analysis is difficult.
Government regulations require medical institutions to perform control tests on instruments used for patient testing at regular intervals to ensure the accuracy of test results. Health care professionals that operate such instruments are also required to undergo periodic recertification.
Members of the institution's administrative staff are frequently responsible for the review of instrument control test data and recertification procedures to ensure compliance with federal regulations. In many instances, however, administrators identify tests involving “out-of-specification” instruments, expired supplies (e.g., test strips), or uncertified health care professionals after testing has been completed. These test results are either accepted or the patient can be subjected to another test.
It is therefore desirable to have a health data management system in which each of a plurality of medical test instruments are connected to a data communications network to provide real time transfer of patient test results to a centralized location. In addition, it is desirable to include in such a system a security mechanism for preventing testing of patients with “out-of-specification” instruments, expired supplies (e.g., test strips), or uncertified health care professionals.